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I couldn’t say a word, still staring at the ring.

“Stop me,” Étienne said, his breath ragged and raw, one hand tight on my waist, fingers digging into my flesh, the palm spanning my heated skin.

“Stop me right now.”

But I didn’t, my hand just frozen in place as he slipped the ring on my finger, his much bigger ones not quite steady.

Oh ancestors, it fit just perfectly. Like it was made for me. Like he knew me.

“Let me have another chance,” he whispered in my ear. “I promise it’ll be different this time.”

“I’ve heard your promises,” I said, the shine from my ring casting a light all down the walls.

“I vow it. I’d rather die than disappoint you again,” he said fiercely. “Strike me through the heart now, Léonie. You will have to kill me to get me to stop trying for a second chance.”

His arms caged me, those bloody, brutal arms that had killed how many people for me and my son? But now they held me gently, carefully. Like I could break.

But I wouldn’t break. No matter what happened. And I knew that now.

“Ask me tomorrow,” I said.

And he did.

And he asked the next day. And the next.

Every day Ciel grew bigger, stronger, his eyes staying open for longer. And he loved looking at his daddy, having his daddy gently pat his back to burp him, and hear little mountain songs sung in Étienne’s deep, gravelly voice.

And Étienne was true to his word. He did not stay away for long. He was back for dinner. He did not shut me out of his world, but shared what was happening and what he had done that day.

This is what it could have been all along. This is what it should have been all along.

But without what had happened, would I ever have been able to look my husband boldly in the eyes as I could now, or would I always have been that wife who thought her husband was doing her a favor by glancing in her direction, who was so grateful for any scrap of his attention that she would overlook anything for him?

I didn’t live like that anymore.

I could live without Étienne Bastide. And not only live, I could thrive without him. Ciel and I could go anywhere and be anything. Hugo now had the power and ability to make us disappear, and we could go back to the Savatier home whenever we wanted. We had the money and resources to live without him.

But could I ever love another man as much as him?

As much as that once-upon-a-time god, the one who had massively fucked up and was trying to fix it?

Could I take away the daddy Ciel loved? Didn’t Ciel see what was real and true in Étienne? The loving father and husband who would kill to protect us?

Come back to me.

Come all the way back.

He begged, he pleaded, but I didn’t give in right away.

Was this my husband who could be so gentle and kind, not just to me, but to the Savatiers too, when we visited, sitting and listening to their long stories at night, staying longer and longer each time until they knew to brighten up at his arrival?

And soon he was a part of the household too, bringing in beautiful rainbow trout or ruffled grouse for Tilly to cook.

Étienne had offered terms to Hugo and the Savatiers, a generous, unthinkable partnership with them. Riches, wealth, power. The keys to his kingdom.

There would be peace between our families, he told me.

The mountain feuds could all die here.